Superman V.S The Elite

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

A problem according to whom?

If you take inspiration from the Frank Miller Batman, then it shouldn't be surprising that he's killing. You have to ALSO consider the manner in which he carries out his justice in BvS. There IS a general no killing rule that he and other characters have. Not to say that it just never happens, but when he is driving people off the road with a cannon left and right, there is plenty to say other than simply "he never kills ever."

[TrueMetis]

TBH aside from a handful of tiny things, I don't particularly like the Nolanverse nor the Burtonverse either. In large part because yes, he kills or allows people to die.

[iwfan53]

M.A.C.O. also said before that live action adaptations of Batman got away with killing too, like in the Burtonverse and Nolanverse. but it's suddenly a problem when Batflek does it.

The closest Batman comes to killing anyone in the Nolanverse is the "I don't have to save you" to Ra's al Ghul in the first movie which is really wibbly wobbly grey area to call killing. The fact that he has a no killing rule is in point of fact the very cornerstone of the second Nolan movie....

BATMAN: I have one rule.

THE JOKER: Oh, then that's the rule you'll have to break....

Also notice that by the end of the second movie he's moved beyond "don't have to save you" when he very deliberately saves the Joker.

We can't blame Harvey's Death on Batman when Batman had previously dropped someone off of that very same building and had them survive so it was only a fault of the way that Harvey landed that ended up killing him rather than Batman's plan.

In the Burton verse yes he kills but it also leads up to this in Batman Forever

Dick Grayson: All I can think about every second of the day is getting Two-Face. He took my whole life. And when I was out there tonight, I imagined it was him that I was fighting, even when I was fighting you. And all the pain went away. Do you understand?

Bruce Wayne: Yes, I do.

Dick Grayson: Good, cause you gotta help me find him. And when we do, I'm the one who kills him.

Bruce Wayne: So, you're willing to take a life.

Dick Grayson: Long as it's Two-Face.

Bruce Wayne: Then it will happen this way: You make the kill, but your pain doesn't die with Harvey, it grows. So you run out into the night to find another face, and another, and another, until one terrible morning you wake up and realize that revenge has become your whole life. And you won't know why.

Dick Grayson: You can't understand. Your family wasn't killed by a maniac.

Bruce Wayne: Yes, they were. We're the same.


It's almost like the fact that whatever other problems Batman Forever has, parts of it serve as a direct commentary agreeing with people that it was wrong for Batman to kill in the two movies that have come before it as Batman himself has realized what a horrible place it has taken him to.


In short, people did actually complain when Batman killed in the Burton movies (it just wasn't as obvious since we didn't have the internet) it was why they eventually became the Schumacher movies (which take place in the same continuity even if they have a vastly different style to them) where he doesn't kill, and Batman stuck to his no killing policy in the Nolan movies which is why people didn't complain about it.

maybe I am being cynical but I think the root of my problem is I can't reconcile the optimistic tone of Superman stories most of the time when he lives in a world where super intelligent and super powered psychopaths break out of prison and slaughter thousands of innocents on a daily basis and there is absolutely no progress at fixing such a broken legal system. I mean, the status quo of villains always breaking back out has been going on for decades, even in-story with nothing changing about that.

That is an entirely reasonable point of view to take.

By the way I've thought it over and I realized that there is a superhero style story that I think you might enjoy that does really deal with concepts like this.

It's The Secrets of Supervillainy series by C. T. Phipps (a series of novels rather than comics but the effect is still the same) to put it in comic terms, it is the story of a guy who wants to be a Silver Age supervillain (then I'll ram my flying pirate ship into Wallstreet and force the mind controlled CEO I kidnapped to sell all his stocks to me!) living in a dank depressing city that is at the nadir of Frank Miller and Rob Liefeld (lots of pouches, lots of guns, EXTREME!!!) and how he basically ends up being considered a superhero by everyone but himself.

He never jumps off the slippery slope, he makes the world a better place by killing supervillains, and it contains several studies of how he interacts with more straight laced no killing superheroes.

[Dragon Ball Fan]

maybe I am being cynical but I think the root of my problem is I can't reconcile the optimistic tone of Superman stories most of the time when he lives in a world where super intelligent and super powered psychopaths break out of prison and slaughter thousands of innocents on a daily basis and there is absolutely no progress at fixing such a broken legal system. I mean, the status quo of villains always breaking back out has been going on for decades, even in-story with nothing changing about that.

That is an entirely reasonable point of view to take.

By the way I've thought it over and I realized that there is a superhero style story that I think you might enjoy that does really deal with concepts like this.

It's The Secrets of Supervillainy series by C. T. Phipps (a series of novels rather than comics but the effect is still the same) to put it in comic terms, it is the story of a guy who wants to be a Silver Age supervillain (then I'll ram my flying pirate ship into Wallstreet and force the mind controlled CEO I kidnapped to sell all his stocks to me!) living in a dank depressing city that is at the nadir of Frank Miller and Rob Liefeld (lots of pouches, lots of guns, EXTREME!!!) and how he basically ends up being considered a superhero by everyone but himself.

He never jumps off the slippery slope, he makes the world a better place by killing supervillains, and it contains several studies of how he interacts with more straight laced no killing superheroes.

okay but that doesn't really help the discussion as it relates to Superman stories or any DC hero for that matter. but as I said before, there are other continuities that I don't have this problems with, specifically the ones that don't have the paper prison or death is meaningless status quo for even villains or continuities like the DCAU where the those two problems are absolutely tame compared to the comics.

[iwfan53]

okay but that doesn't really help the discussion as it relates to Superman stories or any DC hero for that matter. but as I said before, there are other continuities that I don't have this problems with, specifically the ones that don't have the paper prison or death is meaningless status quo for even villains or continuities like the DCAU where the those two problems are absolutely tame compared to the comics.

I want to see Superman as a beacon of hope, regardless of how dark the world he lives in /the real world is, and one who would never allow himself to sink to killing a foe, but instead always prove himself to be strong and smart enough to win without needing to resort to lethal measures against his enemies, and be morally upright enough that he would never give into the desire to misuse his powers.

That is what to my understanding many people want to see Superman as, because it was how he was portrayed in the comics/cartoons they grew up with and they don't want to see that particular part of their childhood altered no matter how irrational or silly it is.

"Also it brings to mind a certain passage from Hogfather...

All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable."

REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.

"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little—"

YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.

"So we can believe the big ones?"

YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING."


Superman is the little lie I learned to believe in as a child, so as an adult I can still believe in the big lies of Truth, Justice and the American Way no matter how little of the qualities are currently being displayed by the American Government....

I have an emotional gut reaction/connection to Superman and hearing about (and seeing clips of) how he was portrayed in Man of Steel and and Batman Versus Superman (not to mention how Batman was portrayed in that movie) is why I refuse to pay money to see DCEU films in theaters or by DVDs of them.

Superman is to me the secular equivalent of Jesus Christ, and so I want to see this...

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/VuoLs1XU4Wc/maxresdefault.jpg


http://images.fanpop.com/images/image_uploads/Buddy-Christ-kevin-smith-70822_360_640.jpg

I don't want to see this...

https://i.kinja-img.com/gawker-media/image/upload/s--4UyVeMt_--/c_scale,f_auto,fl_progressive,q_80,w_800/jjy9lmlwigmh2qnzkt3j.png

https://img.cinemablend.com/filter:scale/quill/2/3/1/5/d/e/2315de94d041f2bed23d0768ebecdfd96fbdb1c2.jpg?mw=600

It's an emotional reaction that I believe (I could be wrong) many people share, and I'm not sure what I can say beyond this point, because it feels like we're not so much even arguing as simply stating our view points on how we want to see Superman protrayed in different ways by the media.

[BridgeConsoleMasher]

Justice League Gods and Villains has a pretty good alternate take where killing is embraced as the story runs.

[TheStarWarsTrek]

but then how come other universes like the Injustice reality, breaking the killing rule goes bad, is it just a simple as "just because it worked out in that timeline doesn't mean it will work out in all of them"?

Watsonian explanations aren't always worth it. I could bend over backwords trying to come up with an explanation for why it worked in one universe but not another, but the end of the day the reason is that one author wanted to show why the no killing rule was a bad thing, and the other author wanted to show why the no killing rule was a good thing.

but as someone else implied earlier, Superman's ideals are not disconnected from reality but they are very much disconnected from HIS reality. it's clear that leaving things up to society in the DC Universe is a lost cause and if Superman is providing anything in terms of hope, it is not enough.

I disagree but I'll get more into this below.

and again, you said Superman and Batman know they can't hold others to the same moral standards as themselves, when was that point made? maybe it's because I am more familiar with adaptations like cartoons but from what I see, they do force everyone else to be exactly like them.

This is mostly an assumption on my part. But I wasn't talking about how Batman or Superman expect other Justice League members not to kill either. I was talking about how they react to regular cops and soldiers. We've never seen Superman try to disarm the entire US armed forces, or seen Batman try to take away Comissioner Gordon's gun and tell him he has to rely on martial arts from now on.

maybe I am being cynical but I think the root of my problem is I can't reconcile the optimistic tone of Superman stories most of the time when he lives in a world where super intelligent and super powered psychopaths break out of prison and slaughter thousands of innocents on a daily basis and there is absolutely no progress at fixing such a broken legal system. I mean, the status quo of villains always breaking back out has been going on for decades, even in-story with nothing changing about that.

First, I think "Thousands every day" is a bit of an exaggeration. The DC universe may have a lot of super villains, but that dosn't mean every single one of those supervillains is slaughtering the population of a small town every moment they're not in jail. Even someone like the Joker is usually shown waiting/recovering for a few months every time he's arrested, or is shown as lying low, and he sometimes goes small scale instead of the gassing a lot of civilians route.

Second, is the issue of what TvTropes calls Comic Book Time. Take as an example one of Linkara's clone saga reviews. The Jackal talks about events that happened in the original clone saga as if they happened a few years ago. Linkara points out that IRL 20 years had happened since the original story. Those few years covered a several presidents and pop culture/technology changes. It may seem like the Joker has been slaughtering people for "decades" since IRL writers have been telling stories about the Joker since the 1940's, but in Comic Book Time it may be shorter. Especially when you consider all the times the universe has rebooted.

[iwfan53]

Justice League Gods and Villains has a pretty good alternate take where killing is embraced as the story runs.

Even if they didn't focus on it much, I appreciate that movie for having the guts to take the fact that Superman is always supposed to be an Immigrant, and then say "okay but what does it mean to be an immigrant to America right now?" and really dig in on that, rather than just having his parents still be Mid-western but no longer be perfectly supportive of his superhero lifestyle.

Presenting Superman as the kind of kid who today ICE would be locking in a cage if they got a chance is so much more ballsy, modern and thought provoking than anything Zack Snyder did in either of his movies.

[M.A.C.O.]

M.A.C.O. also said before that live action adaptations of Batman got away with killing too, like in the Burtonverse and Nolanverse. but it's suddenly a problem when Batflek does it.

The closest Batman comes to killing anyone in the Nolanverse is the "I don't have to save you" to Ra's al Ghul in the first movie which is really wibbly wobbly grey area to call killing. The fact that he has a no killing rule is in point of fact the very cornerstone of the second Nolan movie....

BATMAN: I have one rule.

THE JOKER: Oh, then that's the rule you'll have to break....

Also notice that by the end of the second movie he's moved beyond "don't have to save you" when he very deliberately saves the Joker.

We can't blame Harvey's Death on Batman when Batman had previously dropped someone off of that very same building and had them survive so it was only a fault of the way that Harvey landed that ended up killing him rather than Batman's plan.

In the Burton verse yes he kills but it also leads up to this in Batman Forever

Dick Grayson: All I can think about every second of the day is getting Two-Face. He took my whole life. And when I was out there tonight, I imagined it was him that I was fighting, even when I was fighting you. And all the pain went away. Do you understand?

Bruce Wayne: Yes, I do.

Dick Grayson: Good, cause you gotta help me find him. And when we do, I'm the one who kills him.

Bruce Wayne: So, you're willing to take a life.

Dick Grayson: Long as it's Two-Face.

Bruce Wayne: Then it will happen this way: You make the kill, but your pain doesn't die with Harvey, it grows. So you run out into the night to find another face, and another, and another, until one terrible morning you wake up and realize that revenge has become your whole life. And you won't know why.

Dick Grayson: You can't understand. Your family wasn't killed by a maniac.

Bruce Wayne: Yes, they were. We're the same.


It's almost like the fact that whatever other problems Batman Forever has, parts of it serve as a direct commentary agreeing with people that it was wrong for Batman to kill in the two movies that have come before it as Batman himself has realized what a horrible place it has taken him to.


In short, people did actually complain when Batman killed in the Burton movies (it just wasn't as obvious since we didn't have the internet) it was why they eventually became the Schumacher movies (which take place in the same continuity even if they have a vastly different style to them) where he doesn't kill, and Batman stuck to his no killing policy in the Nolan movies which is why people didn't complain about it.

That’s not correct.

Both Two-Face in Forever and Ra’s in Begins die because Batman puts them in danger, and then decides not to save them.

With Two-Face, it was baiting Harvey to toss his coin, and then throwing a handful of them at the same time. Knowing Harvey can’t make decisions without his tosses. Harvey falls off the ledge and plummets to his death. While Batman, who had just demonstrated he could man a daring mid air rescue, with Chase and Robin. Stands by and allow Harvey to die.

Like with Ra’s, it’s another, “I won’t kill you, but I don’t have to save you” moment.

Also Bruce blows up Ra’s house in the Begins. With League members and prisoners still in cages. But i’ll let that slide.


In TDK, Batman kills Two-Face by tackling him off a ledge. Before Harvey can complete a coin toss on whether Gordon’s son will be shot in the head.

In TDKRises, Batman shoots and kills Talia’s driver. Which causes the truck to run off the overpass and kill Talia too.

The only films Batman hasn’t directly or indirectly killed anyone are Batman and Robin and Justice League.

All this, despite Nolan Batman repeating in every film that he doesn’t kill.

[Dragon Ball Fan]

First, I think "Thousands every day" is a bit of an exaggeration. The DC universe may have a lot of super villains, but that dosn't mean every single one of those supervillains is slaughtering the population of a small town every moment they're not in jail. Even someone like the Joker is usually shown waiting/recovering for a few months every time he's arrested, or is shown as lying low, and he sometimes goes small scale instead of the gassing a lot of civilians route.

Second, is the issue of what TvTropes calls Comic Book Time. Take as an example one of Linkara's clone saga reviews. The Jackal talks about events that happened in the original clone saga as if they happened a few years ago. Linkara points out that IRL 20 years had happened since the original story. Those few years covered a several presidents and pop culture/technology changes. It may seem like the Joker has been slaughtering people for "decades" since IRL writers have been telling stories about the Joker since the 1940's, but in Comic Book Time it may be shorter. Especially when you consider all the times the universe has rebooted.

I may have based my dissatisfaction with the no killing rule on an exaggerated view of how much damage villains cause. but I still feel as though certain villains are existential threats to society just by existing. if comic writers want me to believe the justice system works and uphold the no killing rule then, here's what they have to do, the next time the Joker or Major Force are arrested, that's it, they stay locked up and are never in the comics ever again.

and again, what about the fact that there has been absolutely no change at all in the shit legal system of comic book universes that allows the paper prison problem? and since we have stuff like the Justice Society of the main universe, hasn't this problem indeed been going on since the 1940s even in-story?

and I did say there are certain alternate continuity stories where I can live with the no killing rule because the villains are very tame compared to the comics and they break out of prison far less often.